European Minorities Torn Between Worlds

Socialist presidential candidate Segolene Royal delivers a speech at the Rose Festival in Guingamp, western France, in this Oct. 1, 2006 file photo. Royal said Saturday, Nov. 25, 2006 that integrating France's minorities into the workforce is key to the revival, and survival, of the nation's sluggish economy. "France not only needs you, but it is you who are the future of France," Royal told about 400 people from disadvantaged suburbs nationwide gathered in Bondy, a town northeast of Paris whose neglected housing projects were among those wracked by riots a year ago. Inscription reads : "Let's organise the 2007's victory". (AP Photo/Vincent Michel) (Vincent Michel - AP)

And a debate has erupted in Holland over Islamic halal meat after a major supermarket chain introduced it in their stores. Animal rights activists complained the animals are slaughtered inhumanely.

Perceptions that Muslim Europeans are halfhearted in condemning terrorism _ or even try to justify it _ have swung much of public opinion against the Islamic minority and caused people to question whether its values are compatible with the West's. The fact most of the perpetrators of last year's London transit attacks were homegrown Muslims has fueled the backlash against cultural tolerance.

Many views once limited to the far-right have become mainstream. In the Netherlands, a strict new immigration law requires people seeking citizenship to undergo assimilation training and pass a test on Dutch culture and language. In France, Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, the center-right's leading presidential candidate, seemed to echo the extreme-right National Front's love-it-or-leave-it rhetoric last month when he declared his country "doesn't want those who don't love it."

A Dutch poll released in June found that half of Dutch people dislike Muslims, though the numbers shrink sharply when the questions get specific _ only 10 percent consider themselves smarter than immigrants, while 17 percent said immigrants tend to be criminals, rude and lazy.

Experiences of racism were widespread among the young people interviewed for this story _ and the strategy of most is stoicism.

"It doesn't happen frequently, but when it does, I shut my mouth _ I don't answer back," said Shen Li, a 24-year-old Chinese law student in Madrid who arrived in Spain a decade ago.

Meantime, many minority youths complain of discrimination in the job market. Berrouba, 26, recalled being rejected for a hairstylist's job when she was 17.

"The owner said, 'I don't want to hire you, because we're looking for someone who doesn't look like a North African,'" she said. "He was very apologetic, upset, and asked me for a thousand pardons. But that's just the way it was."

When a bit older, she applied at a more luxurious hair salon.

"My hair was too long and looked too Arab, so I cut it and dyed it blond _ and I got the job!" It was a new lease on life. "Even for nightclubs, I was able to get in everywhere," she said.

Ozturk said his job prospects are uncertain in Germany despite his excellent grades.

"My father wants me to go abroad, to America or England. He says I have a better chance if I'm an Oxford or a Harvard graduate," he said.

In France, an upcoming report from a newly created anti-discrimination agency says that for young jobseekers, "It's better to be named Alain than Mohamed." Other official reports in France have made the astonishing observation that some temporary jobs agencies classify white applicants as "BBR" _ a French acronym for the Blue, White and Red colors of the national flag.

The fact that such policies are illegal, and that an anti-discrimination agency exists, demonstrates that France is taking at least some measures, as have other European countries.

In Germany, a law took effect in August outlawing discrimination based on gender, age and religious affiliation in the workplace.

Paris' elite Sciences Po political university is actively recruiting immigrant youths while Sarkozy, despite his hard-line stance on illegal immigration, has implemented a pilot affirmative-action program in the police force.

Across the European Union, several countries have been working to implement EU guidelines against discrimination.

Europeans say their societies are not a U.S.-style melting pot, and their citizenships are inherited and not easily acquired by naturalization. And most of the young people interviewed didn't seem keen on the melting-pot idea either, expressing a preference for marrying within their own ethnic background and religion.

Ozturk, a Muslim, recently broke up with a Catholic Peruvian girlfriend; he is now dating a Muslim Turk.

"I always thought it wouldn't matter what religion one has when you're in love, but ... I think that if I was married to a non-Turkish woman, we could have problems raising our kids," he said.

Many Muslims said the terror threat has put them under scrutiny they find stifling.

"When I'm asked what my ethnicity is on an application form, I say Egypt," said Ali el Hamamy, a 19-year-old student of Egyptian origin at London's City University. "Before, I used to say Arab. Arab now is a term used for terrorism. Egypt is a holiday destination."

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Jamey Keaten reported from Paris and Palma Benczenleitner from Berlin. Contributing are AP correspondents Tariq Panja in London, Maria Sanminiatelli in Rome, Bruce Mutsvairo and Scheherezade Faramarzi in Amsterdam, and Mar Roman in Madrid.